Eric LoPresti: Superbloom

Superbloom is a solo exhibition by NYC-based artist Eric LoPresti at the New Mexico State University Art Gallery opening in September of 2018. It includes large format watercolors, a two-channel video installation and a series of events about the confluence of apocalypse and sublime in the American West.

LoPresti is a NYC-based artist who grew up near the Hanford site, where the US manufactured plutonium for the Nagasaki atomic bomb. In Superbloom, he explores this complex relationship through paintings, video and a sequence of performances incorporating local martial artists.

The works are both representational and abstract, referencing nuclear testing sites in Nevada, indigenous desert flowers, and the harmonizing Japanese practice of aikido. Sited a mere 97 miles from Trinity, location of the first atomic bomb, the exhibition outlines an expansive framework within which viewers can meditate on two increasingly relevant antipodes of human experience: the quest for aesthetic expression, and the threat of global apocalypse.